The (I)nterview

Today, at work, The Interviewee brought her mother to her job interview. Sigh.

At first, we thought they were lost because we’d expected only one person but no, it was The Interviewee. And her mother.

We also thought that her mother would leave shortly after but nope, she made herself comfortable in the waiting area.

While The Interviewee was in with The Boss, The Interviewee’s mother “interviewed” us, her daughter’s potential workmates. Sigh again.

The Mother walked around the office, commented on how busy we looked and asked if we had to work late. “Depends,” my colleague replied. I was hiding behind my PC trying to avoid eye contact.

We also had new chairs being delivered that day and when the delivery guys brought the chairs into the office, The Mother immediately went to one of the new chairs, sat down, adjusted the chair height and made herself comfortable! She even remarked that it wasn’t quite comfortable and maybe we should’ve chosen another design! I made sure to mark the chair she’d sat on so that I wouldn’t be the unlucky recipient later.

By then I was sincerely hoping that her daughter did badly in the interview and that we’d never be workmates. And why was the interview taking so long? Not a good sign.

When The Interviewee finally left with her mother, we breathed a sigh of relief. Later we learnt that The Interviewee didn’t even schedule the interview, it was her mother. Also, The Interviewee wasn’t the one who sent in her resume for the position. Yes, it was her mother. Surprising that The Mother wasn’t in the interview with her daughter.

Yup, strangest interview ever. And thank goodness, The Interviewee didn’t become The Workmate.

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17 thoughts on “The (I)nterview”

Mine was being the interviewer and asking an open question along the lines of what experience do you have for the role… the interviewee started with a story of when he was 4 years old, and then literally contniued chronologically year by year until we stopped him…

That made me literally cringe! I can’t help feeling bad for the poor girl who has to call that her mother. Imagine what life must be like when your mother dictates everything. Eeks! lol I once read an article that stated bringing a parent to the interview was a no-no and would hurt your chances of getting the job. That kind of leads me to believe this isn’t all that uncommon. Scary thought, huh?

Yes, there’s an emerging disturbing here of parents tagging along with their kids for job interviews. This is generally for their first jobs so the kids are fresh out of university. But seriously, this trend is disturbing as heck

Wow, that’s a new one on me! I once interviewed a girl for a position as a photographer. When I asked her what experience she had, she replied “I can write”. Well that’s great but not really relevant!
Debbie

The mother probably got tired of her daughter sitting around the house doing nothing all day. I’ll bet she came with the daughter to make sure she actually made it to the interview. The thing about the mother trying out the chairs is a little bizarre, though. I remember we got new chairs that were really uncomfortable. A representative of the company that sold them to us came around and I complained, and his response was “our chairs are fine, you just don’t know how to sit!”

I was asked to join in on a team interview once, and before the candidate came into the room the personnel guy came in and said, “please be gentle with this one. (A guy I knew was a real playboy) recommended her.” When the (quite attractive) young woman came into the room, it was obvious she was unqualified and the only reason the guy recommended her was for her physical attributes. Not to say she wasn’t a pleasant person, but it was deer-in-the-headlights with every question.

She was nice enough and seemed to know a thing or two, but there was no way we could have hired her. She was a little spacey and had some huge gaps in her knowledge. And the guy who recommended her knew that, and probably knew we would have known that, too…